


Nothing Worth Having

by PR Zed (przed)



Category: Sherlock Holmes (2009)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-01
Updated: 2010-05-01
Packaged: 2017-10-18 20:31:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/193004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/przed/pseuds/PR%20Zed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Watson is kidnapped, Holmes and Mary must come to an accommodation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing Worth Having

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my fab betas, [](http://matociquala.livejournal.com/profile)[**matociquala**](http://matociquala.livejournal.com/) , [](http://beledibabe.livejournal.com/profile)[**beledibabe**](http://beledibabe.livejournal.com/) , and [](http://gulffire.livejournal.com/profile)[**gulffire**](http://gulffire.livejournal.com/) , for insisting I needed to greatly expand my first go at this, [](http://draycevixen.livejournal.com/profile)[**draycevixen**](http://draycevixen.livejournal.com/) for being the dissenting opinion in a very supportive way, and [](http://matociquala.livejournal.com/profile)[**matociquala**](http://matociquala.livejournal.com/), for making sure all the i's were dotted and t's crossed.

  
They learn to tolerate each other, Mr. Sherlock Holmes and Mrs. John H. Watson, née Morstan. But they do not find it easy.

For the first few months after the wedding, they engage in a battle for Watson's affection, their weapons sharp looks and sharper words. The hostilities only subside when Watson rebukes them.

"She is the woman I love," he tells Holmes. "I had hoped you would respect that."

"He is the best friend I have in the world," he tells Mary. "I will not be parted from him.

The pain in his eyes shames them both, and they settle into a period of détente.

Holmes has the good sense not to complain when Watson returns to his young wife in the evenings. Mary has the good manners not to mention the occasions when her husband stays the night at Baker Street. When they meet, they are civil, if lacking in cordiality.

All that changes in a day.

* * *

They are working on a delicate case, Holmes and Watson. A matter of a peer of the realm involved in nefarious doings, the merest whisper of which is enough to chill the blood. Holmes is on the verge of acquiring the evidence that will convict the peer, when it happens.

It is a good day, or so Holmes thinks. He has nearly discovered the location of the warehouse that the peer is using to store some of his more despicable brands of contraband, and Watson has promised to spend the night. The latter occurrence is infrequent enough that Holmes is nearly giddy with the thought.

Holmes is in his rooms, puzzling over which of three warehouses he can definitively tie to the peer, when he hears Watson's distinctive gait on the pavement outside. He smiles and moves to the window, never one to lose the opportunity to observe Watson when his friend is unawares. He knows Watson is self-conscious about the way his wounds have hampered his stride, have necessitated the use of a cane, but Holmes can only ever see the grace and power in his movements.

He looks out the window in time to see four men—former soldiers from their bearing, and blackguards by their behaviour—strike Watson and bundle him into a windowless carriage.

Holmes dashes down the 17 steps he knows so well, determined to do what he can. But the four men are still there. They hold Holmes at gunpoint as the carriage containing the one person in the world he cares about disappears around a corner. He observes them, calculates his best plan of attack, but they do not give him time to act. Three of them move in, pinning his arms, while the fourth strikes him with the butt of his gun. Holmes' last thought before consciousness leaves him is that he will not leave one of these men alive. Not if Watson comes to harm.

He awakes on his own settee, with Mrs Hudson hovering over him, Inspector Lestrade sitting at the window, and Mary weeping at the mantle.

"They have taken Watson," he says, though it is clear enough they know already.

Mary is at his side in an instant, wiping her tears with the back of one hand as she hands him an envelope. "This came for you," she says, her voice steadier than he would have given her credit for.

The envelope has been opened. It holds a single sheet of paper with three words written in a strong, masculine hand: "Halt your investigations."

"You've read it?"

Mary nods.

"I won't. Halt my investigations, that is."

"I know." Mary meets his gaze steadily, her expression steadfast in spite of her tear-ruined face. "I don't want you to. _He_ wouldn't want you to."

He sits up, ignoring as irrelevant the wave of nausea that threatens to swamp him, and looks to the Inspector.

"I assume I have your assistance, Lestrade?"

"Anything you need, Mr. Holmes. Anything to help the doctor."

Holmes responds with a curt nod. Within hours, he is on the streets and searching for his friend.

He has the Irregulars scatter throughout London and contact everyone he might once have assisted, on the assumption that one never knows from whence useful intelligence might come. He uses every source of information available, calls in favours from Scotland Yard and infamous criminals alike. It will be the work of many months to repay the debts he accrues on Watson's behalf, and he begrudges none.

He determines which warehouse belongs to the peer, but it has been emptied mere hours before he arrives. He finds an opium den in Wapping, a discreet bordello in Kensington, and a common bawdy house in Whitechapel, all with tenuous connections to the peer, but Watson is in none of them, and Holmes cannot even prove their connection with his new nemesis.

Increasingly, Holmes becomes convinced that the villain is holding Watson in his London residence, but he relies on instinct, not proof. Sympathetic though he is, Lestrade cannot obtain a warrant to search the premises without evidence, not even on the instinct of Sherlock Holmes, and the peer has protected himself too well through reputation and ruthlessness for any judge to willingly oppose him.

Five days after Watson's abduction, a young woman appears the sitting room at Baker Street. She is a professional woman whom Holmes assisted on the matter of a disreputable suitor nearly a year before.

"You did me a service, Mr. Holmes. Now I hope I can do you one in return."

Holmes has not slept in three days, has not eaten in two, but he sees that his guest is comfortably seated and rings Mrs. Hudson for tea before allowing her to continue.

"They say that a certain aristocratic gentleman may have done Doctor Watson harm. And that you might require some access to his household."

"That is true."

"The gentleman in question requires a scullery maid. And his housekeeper has approached the agency that employs me to fill the position. I can fill it with whom I choose. If there is someone you have in mind?"

Holmes nods, even as he ransacks the list of his acquaintances for the right person.

Irene is the obvious choice, but Irene is on the Continent. Even if she were in London, Holmes fears she would balk at this assignment. She has never been one for manual labour, and she only tolerates Watson because Holmes will do nothing without the good doctor. She clearly recognizes her only rival for Holmes' affections.

But there is Mary…

Holmes lets the young woman finish her tea, sees her out with the promise to send her an applicant for the scullery maid position as soon as possible, and then prepares to visit Mrs. Watson.

She is holding up well, the former Mary Morstan. As she greets him in her sitting room, her eyes are clear, and her hands are steady. Holmes has seen many men and women deal with grief in the course of his profession, and Mary is handling it better than most.

She greets Holmes with courtesy and listens to him politely. But he has not said three sentences before she is leaning forward, her expression eager, and she interrupts before he is entirely finished.

"I will take the position." There is no doubt in her voice, no hesitation.

"You are certain? You will need to do the hard work of a scullery maid. And if any member of the peer's household discovers you are Watson's wife, you will face great danger."

"Will this assist you in finding John?"

"Yes."

"Then I will take the position." She speaks with the serenity of one who is utterly certain of her actions. He recognizes those qualities that Watson must also have seen in her: her bravery, her resourcefulness, her complete devotion.

It has taken this calamity, the possibility of them both losing Watson, but Holmes is now certain: Mary's love for Watson is as great as his own.

* * *

When the parlour maid tells Mary that Mr. Sherlock Holmes is waiting in the sitting room, she almost cannot bear to receive him. But for John's sake, she does, hoping that Holmes has brought her word of her dearest husband.

She has never understood John's connection to him, this brilliant man with so difficult a temperament. John has always spoken of him warmly, but she has never observed warmth in his behaviour, only arrogance and ego.

This day, however, he displays none of those traits. He is more ragged than she has ever seen him, unshaven and unkempt, with dark circles under his eyes. He will drive himself into the grave, if he keeps this pace, and she has the epiphany that he does not care. He would lose his health and more if it meant finding his friend. Her husband. In that moment, she understands Holmes' devotion to John.

When she realizes what he is asking of her, she agrees without hesitation. She knows it will be difficult, will be dangerous, but if it gains John his freedom, it will be worth the difficulty, worth the danger.

The next morning she reports to the employment agent using the false identity Holmes has arranged, and by the afternoon she is up to her elbows in scalding water and dirty pots.

It is not easy to learn the layout of a house when you are not expected to venture beyond the kitchen and your own garret room, but Mary manages it. She volunteers for every unpleasant task that will take her beyond the cook's realm. She scrubs steps, collects men's boots for polishing, does all the little jobs the housemaids consider beneath them. And all the time she is keeping her eyes open, noting who comes and goes, and when. She secretes papers and pencils in her apron, and scribbles notes about the habits of the household. She makes a detailed map of the house and its grounds, and determines the positions of the men who guard the premises, pointing out what appear to be weak points in their protection.

She makes the most important discovery one afternoon, as she is delivering an urn of coffee to one of the residence's grand salons for the consumption of the peer's guests. She tries to take a different route through the house each time she moves through it, and this time she comes upon a deserted hallway in a distant wing of the house.

She has taken one step down the echoing hallway, when two men appear from the first room. Rough sorts, they seem to her, wearing simple tweed suits and frowning expressions.

"What are you doing here, girl?" the nearest one says. She examines the man closely, as Holmes has instructed her, and can see the outline of a gun in one of his pockets.

"I'm meant to deliver this to the west sitting room," she says, lifting the urn. "I must be turned around." She affects a flustered air that is only partly counterfeit. "I'm new to the household."

"You must be new, to mistake this for the west sitting room." The men's laughter is not kindly. "Go back the way you came, girl, and make a left at the end of the hall. And don't come here again."

"Not without a pot of tea for us," the other man adds.

She glances back as she moves away from the unpleasant men, and sees one of them go to a room halfway down the hall and test the door handle. She takes special note of that door. John must be behind it, she thinks. He must. And alive, or they would not take such care to keep him so isolated.

John is alive. She clings to the thought as her hands grow raw from peeling potatoes and scrubbing pots.

She passes on her intelligence through one of Holmes' urchins, his Irregulars, he calls them. Wiggins is scruffy and impudent and smart. He has made friends with the groom, and does odd jobs for him—fetches him tobacco, and gin. He makes certain he is at the stables each evening when Mary brings the groom and the stable lads their dinners. She passes him her notes in the bundle of food she always gives him. The bundle itself not entirely for show. Wiggins looks undernourished, and always seems grateful for the meat pies and jam tarts she manages to purloin for him.

On her fifth night there, Wiggins passes her a note and a small package back.

"Obtain the household keys," the note says. "Make moulds in the wax I have supplied. Wiggins will bring new instructions tomorrow." The package holds five cases with wax on either side.

Her heart pounds as she realizes that her time in this hateful house is nearly done. That they are close to rescuing John. And she takes comfort in the terse words from Holmes. He is her lifeline, her connection to the outside world. He is the one person who cares about John as she does. _Exactly_ as she does. Somewhere along the way, her jealousy of Holmes' position in John's life has begun to evaporate. Now she is only grateful for the lengths to which Holmes is willing to go to rescue her husband.

She manages to get hold of the keys, though it is not easy. She has earned the goodwill of the cook through hard work, and is given the task of fetching bottles from the locked wine cellar, the cook's great jangling key ring placed in her trust. That gives her the keys to the servants' entrance, the cellar, and several storerooms. She manages to pick the pocket of the head butler for the front door key, though that is less a feat that it sounds. The man is always drunk, and far too susceptible to the charms of a pretty face. Mary thinks of John as she lets the odious man give her a peck on the cheek, and thinks of her own dignity as she slaps him, hard, moments after she has returned the key to his pocket. She is lucky she is not fired then and there, but the man only laughs and sends her on his way.

The final keys, the ones to the gate and outbuildings, Wiggins obtains. He brings the groom and his stable boys gin dosed with some soporific drug that Holmes has no doubt supplied, and makes his own moulds of the keys as the stable staff slumbers on. He is finishing with the final key when Mary arrives. He gives her a wink as he places the keys back in the groom's pocket, and thanks her for the moulds and his dinner. She has given him more of the cold roast beef than he could possibly eat, and suggests he share his bounty with some of the other Irregulars. When this is all over, she has decided, she will host regular dinners for the Irregulars. Holmes provides for them, after a fashion, but she has no doubt that they would benefit from the care of a feminine hand as well. It will be fair payment for the service Wiggins has rendered her John.

Before he leaves, Wiggins gives her an envelope, addressed in Holmes' now familiar hand.

He will stage his rescue of John the following evening, and encourages her to fly the household with Wiggins immediately.

"I will not put you in further danger," he writes. "Not when you are so valued by my dearest friend."

Mary refuses to leave.

Not even Wiggins' pleading will shift her resolve. "The Guv won't like it, Mrs. W."

"The Guv will have to live with it," she says firmly, scribbling a note on the reverse of Holmes' letter with the nub of a pencil secreted in her apron. "I can still do him some good here." She folds the note tightly, gives it to Wiggins with strict instructions to bestow it on no one but Holmes, and shoos him on his way. Then she returns to the kitchen to finish her duties for the day, hinting to the cook that the groom and his lads are the worse for drink to shift suspicion from herself in case of questions. When the last pot is scrubbed, she retires to the small garret room she shares with the other scullery maid.

She lays awake for hours, listening to the snoring of her workmate and the expanding silence of the house around her. In the deep of night, when she is certain there is no one left in the household awake, she pulls on her dressing gown and her shoes, and returns to the grounds by the stable.

She finds the packet in the hiding place she specified, a notch in the outer wall of the grounds. The envelope of white powder is wrapped in a note from Holmes: "You are a brave, if foolish, woman. Take care they do not catch you. H."

She smiles at the terse words, so like their author. She begins to further understand John's affection for the man, infuriating though he can be.

She forces herself to rest—she will be no use to John or Holmes if she is too tired—but swears that after this night, she will not sleep again until John has been delivered from his prison and is installed in their own home.

* * *

Holmes has never taken so much care in planning a rescue. But then, never has so much depended on his success. The life of his dearest friend, the man who has the keeping of Holmes' somewhat battered heart, hangs in the balance, and he would as soon surrender his own life as see Watson lose his.

And then there is Mary.

When Wiggins returns without her, Holmes is sorely tempted to extricate Mary from the peer's household himself. Perhaps in the guise of an overprotective brother, determined to save his sister from domestic servitude. Or perhaps in the role of a suitor intent on elopement. But such a disturbance would only raise suspicions in the peer's household, could only hamper his rescue of Watson, so he quells his instinct to protect the lady. She has, after all, proven her self quite able in difficult circumstances.

And her strategy has a certain merit.

He waits until the sun has set to breach the peer's defences.

Dressed all in black, and shod in rubber-soled shoes that should prove admirable for both fighting and fleeing, he enters the grounds at a time when Mary's observations have shown the gate should be unwatched. Surrounding by gardening equipment, he hides in an outbuilding that provides a clear view of the main residence, and waits for the household to quiet. Waiting is not one of the more developed skills in Holmes' repertoire. Waiting gives free rein to all the troublesome voices in his head, those of pessimism and doubt and failure. He will not let those voices triumph, but as always, it is a struggle. It is a struggle he hides from the world—it would not do for the great Sherlock Holmes to exhibit weakness—a struggle no one but Watson has ever seen.

The last light in the main wing is extinguished just after midnight. Holmes waits another fifteen minutes before he approaches the house, keeping a close eye out for the peer's sentinels.

The key made from Mary's mould works perfectly. Holmes slips in through the servants' entrance and makes his way through the residence. Mary's route is exact. He could not have planned it out better himself.

Holmes takes special care as he approaches the hallway Mary suspects is the site of Watson's captivity.

There is no one in the hall, but light shows from underneath two doors. Holmes approaches the first door and listens intently. He hears no talking, only a less than genteel snoring from the room's inhabitants. He smiles, and turns the handle of the door.

Mary's plan has worked perfectly. The two ruffians guarding Watson are sprawled unconscious on the floor, and the drugged pot of tea Mary provided them as refreshment sits innocently on a sideboard. As he approaches the nearer of the two men, the remains of a shattered tea cup crunches under his foot. Neither man stirs.

"Clever girl," Holmes says in admiration. He will never underestimate Mrs. Watson again.

He closes the door behind him and moves to the second door. He hesitates longer here, listening for sounds of movement within. Mary reported only two sentinels in charge of Watson, but that does not mean there are not more within.

He waits outside for a minute, then two, but he cannot discern any sounds at all from within the second room. No talking, no movement. Nothing. There is no keyhole to peer into, no means of checking whether Watson awaits behind the door, alone or under guard. Holmes has only his own conviction, and that of Mary, that Watson is here, separated from him by wood and plaster.

Holmes draws his revolver from his pocket, takes a deep breath to ensure a steady hand, and opens the door. He has only a brief impression that this place is an abandoned sitting room, full of settees and tables and mirrors glittering in the gaslight, when he attention is caught by a voice to his left.

"'Bout bleeding time-"

Holmes pivots swiftly towards the voice, but he has already lost the element of surprise. He finds himself facing a ruffian whose gun is pointing straight at his head. He is calculating the odds of being able to fire his own weapon before the ruffian fires his when someone else speaks behind him.

"I wouldn't, if I were yous."

He identifies the accent as Irish—from the Northern counties if he's not mistaken, and he never is—even as he backs further into the room and turns so he has both of the peer's henchmen in view. He is confronted with a scene from the nightmares that have deprived him of sleep this past week and more.

The second man, an ill-groomed cur with the bearing of a soldier and the smile of a sadist, one of the four men who kidnapped Watson in the first place, has an arm tightly around Watson's throat. His other hand presses a wicked looking knife into the tender flesh just below the line of the doctor's jaw. Holmes tries to forget that he knows what Watson tastes like just there as he evaluates his dear friend's condition.

Watson has been beaten. Repeatedly. One eye is swollen shut, the bruising spectacular and recent. His face bears other bruises, sickly yellow blotches that were inflicted days ago. His shirt—one of his best, Holmes notes—is torn and mottled with blood from multiple wounds. As Holmes watches, he sees a pinprick of scarlet form where the knifepoint touches Watson's skin.

Watson, in spite of the pain he must be in, in spite of the impossibility of the situation, in spite of everything, smiles.

"Lovely to see you, Holmes," Watson says, his nonchalance ridiculous but comforting.

"I see you have company," Holmes replies, suppressing the murderous rage he feels towards the men who have brought his friend to this state. "Should I come back later?"

"I'm sure these gentlemen won't mind if you stay."

"Shut up, both of you," barks the Irishman.

Holmes bites back on a retort and runs through all possible scenarios, trying desperately to hit upon one that will not end up with one or both of them dead. He can find none. He is too far from both men to create an effective diversion. If he shoots the man with the gun, Watson's throat will be cut. If he attacks the man holding Watson first, then he will be shot down himself.

It takes two minutes for a man to bleed to death once his carotid artery is cut. Holmes has seen a man die that way, years ago, in a bar fight in Limehouse. He cannot bear to think of Watson losing his life in so brutal a fashion, staring at him with eyes going glassy as his life drains out onto the parquet floor. He is far more willing to face an enemy's bullets himself.

Holmes tenses and prepares to attack the thug holding Watson, even as he ignores the pleading in Watson's eyes, the slight shake of his head. He only hopes he can save Watson before the bullets stop his own life.

Rescue comes from an unexpected quarter.

Before Holmes can launch himself, Mary bursts into the room, her skirts hiked up and the gun Holmes has given her to protect herself—Watson's service revolver—raised confidently in front of her.

At that moment, Holmes does not think he has ever seen so fine an example of womanhood. Even Irene pales in comparison.

Mary's appearance is the diversion Holmes needs. Both of Watson's captors are temporarily dumbstruck by the sight of an armed scullery maid, and they freeze, mouths agape. Holmes shoots the man with the gun, a clear shot through the heart, and is across the room before the second man can wield his knife.

Holmes has the man disarmed and unconscious in an instant, and if he is more brutal than usual in his method, he doesn't believe either Mary or Watson would blame him.

With the villain no longer holding him upright, Watson sinks to his knees. Holmes puts a hand on one shoulder to steady him, wanting nothing more than to wrap his arms around the man, to breathe in the scent of him and reassure himself that Watson is alive. But there is another here who has a claim on Watson.

"John!" Mary's voice is anguished, and Holmes forces himself to cede his place to Watson's wife. She is more suited to the cosseting Watson will require, he tells himself, even as he experiences a pang that pierces his viscera like the sharpest poignard.

But there is no time for emotional indulgence. Holmes ignores the turmoil churning through his mind, goes to the window, breaks a pane with the butt of his gun, and fires three shots into the air, his agreed upon signal to Lestrade.

In no time the house and grounds are boiling with innumerable black-clad constables. Lestrade has outdone himself this time, but then the inspector is as determined to see the peer imprisoned as Holmes and his clients.

There is shouting and clattering, and Holmes thinks he even hears the peer himself roar an indignant "How dare you," but all his attention is on Watson. The good doctor keeps assuring Mary that he is fine, but Holmes can see he is most definitely not. He has broken ribs, and sprained fingers, at the very least. He will be carrying himself gingerly for some time.

When Lestrade makes an appearance, gruffly thanking Holmes for his assistance, ensuring the doctor is alive, if not entirely well, and managing an astonishing degree of chivalry towards Mary, Holmes puts a word in his ear. Lestrade leaves Clarky and a carriage at their disposal.

Watson insists he needs no help, but he does not make it three steps before his legs give way beneath him. Holmes moves in quickly, catching Watson before he can fall.

"I'm sorry," Watson whispers in his ear as Holmes holds him close. "I feel ridiculous."

"You are never ridiculous, my dear," Holmes assures him, before he and Clarky take him in hand and support him all the way to the carriage. Mary trails behind them, looking somehow both concerned and composed.

When they have him installed in the carriage, Mary enfolds Watson in a rug the coachman supplies and sits beside him, taking his hand in hers. Holmes contents himself with sitting across from Watson, their knees lightly touching.

When they reach Watson household, Holmes means to leave Watson in Mary's care, but he cannot. He needs the reassurance of a living, breathing Watson to completely conquer the fears he has lived with the past week.

He is grateful that Mary does not send him away. She would be within her rights to refuse him access to her home, to Watson. And yet she accepts his presence here with complete grace. For once, Holmes' power of observation forsakes him and he cannot read her motives for her actions. Perhaps it is empathy. Perhaps it is pity. Whatever the reason, he gives thanks for her tolerance, and throws himself into doing what he can for his friend.

Watson's strength has at last failed him entirely. Holmes and Clarky carry him up the narrow stairs and install him in his bed. Clarky vanishes at that point, leaving the doctor to the care of his wife and Holmes. Ignoring Watson's objections that he needs no help, they strip off his torn and bloodied clothing. They clean and bind his wounds together, and have him in a freshly laundered nightshirt when there is a knock at the door.

A maid ushers in the doctor Lestrade has had the sense to send along. The doctor inspects the dressings, tests Watson for concussion and more serious injuries, and tells them what Holmes already knew: that Watson will need some days to recover, but recover he will.

Mary sees Lestrade's doctor out, leaving Holmes alone with Watson. Watson has already drifted into a much-needed sleep, so Holmes feels safe in indulging in a modicum of the sentimentality he usually scorns. He lays a hand over one of Watson's, taking comfort from the warmth of his skin as he watches the rise and fall of his friend's chest.

"I'll be fine, you know," Watson whispers, his eyes opening to mere slits.

"I know," Holmes says. And he does. Which doesn't make Watson's hurts any less, nor does it make Holmes feels any better. Watson has yet again come to harm through his association with Holmes.

"It's not your fault," Watson says. Holmes is not the only one who can deduce the thoughts of others.

"I don't believe other physicians are injured as a regular part of their practice."

"Other doctors were wounded in Afghanistan," Watson says, his war experience his trump card in any argument about Holmes placing him in unnecessary danger.

"Perhaps it is a character flaw of your own." Holmes smiles fondly at Watson. "Why else would you join the army, or trail after a mad detective."

"Perhaps." Watson smiles, a slight raise at the corner of his mouth, which is replaced almost immediately by a tight-lipped grimace of pain that Watson tries and fails to conceal.

"You need sleep, dear boy." Holmes draws a hand lightly down Watson's cheek before standing. "I'll see you in the morning."

Watson's eyes drift shut, then open again, a hint of panic in them that Holmes recognizes too well. "Holmes, you'll listen for-"

"I will," Holmes says, knowing too well what concerns his friend. "Do not trouble yourself."

"Thank you," Watson says before sleep claims him once again.

The impulse to crawl in beside Watson is too great, so after assuring himself that Watson is sleeping soundly, Holmes retreats to the hall. Now that the crisis is over and the adrenaline has faded from his system, he feels fatigue nibbling at the corners of his consciousness, but sleep will have to wait. He has promised Watson he will keep watch, will protect him from the nightmares that always lurk at the edges of Watson's dreams, and so he will.

It will not be the first time.

He has calmed Watson's nightmares since the second week they shared rooms on Baker Street. At first he fought the chimeras of Afghanistan with a firm shake and quiet word. Later, when the intimacy grew between them, Holmes combated them with his own body, stopping cries with kisses and trembling with touch.

Watson's marriage has not stopped this practice. There have been a few nights when Watson has stopped at Baker Street not for a more carnal purpose, but because he knows it is a night when old monsters will re-appear and he wishes to spare Mary from them. Holmes does not resent him for this practice. He is pleased to be able to offer his strength to Watson, when the doctor has so often lent him his own.

There is a tread on the stair, and Mary returns, looking as fatigued as Holmes feels.

"You will stay with us, of course," she says. Holmes nods in response. Even if he had not promised Watson to be his protector this evening, he doubts he has the stomach to part from Watson just yet.

Mary shows him down the hall to a comfortable room that has been reserved for guests. Holmes thanks her, assures her he needs nothing further, then sees her out. He removes his coat and waistcoat, thumbs off his braces, and settles cross-legged on top of the bed to wait for the nightmares he knows will come.

They arrive an hour before dawn.

Holmes is nearly convinced that he is wrong, that they have both been wrong, and Watson will not be troubled by dreams this night. Then he hears a thrashing from down the hall, and the opening notes of a dreadful keening he knows from experience will only grow worse.

He dashes down the hall, silent in his stocking feet, and opens the door to Watson's marital bedroom.

"I'm here," he says. "You're safe." He strokes Watson's forehead. "I won't let anyone hurt you." He takes Watson's hand in his, and Watson clutches it tightly. They remain like that until Watson's shivering has ceased, until Holmes sees the terror fade from his eyes.

"I'm sorry," Watson says for the second time that night.

"I'm not," Holmes replies, and he isn't. He cannot feel sorrow or regret where Watson is concerned.

"You're a madman."

"Absolutely," Holmes agrees, comforted to see the ghost of a smile on Watson's face. They are through the worst of it, then.

He waits until Watson is truly asleep, then gives his shoulder a final gentle pressure before he stands to leave. He freezes as he finds Mary staring at him, her expression sharp and probing, as her eyes glitter in the dark

* * *

Mary is pulled from consciousness by the dream of a storm at sea. She is buffeted by waves, tossed about as if she is no more substantial than a child's toy boat, while John calls out to her over the crash of the surf.

She wakes with a start, and finds herself confronted by a different sort of storm. John lies shaking beside her, his back towards her, while Holmes kneels beside him, whispering comforting words into the darkness.

She listens as Holmes eases her husband's nightmare with a kindness that leaves her quite speechless. This past week, she has come to understand the depth of Holmes' devotion to John, but never would she have thought him capable of this, this…tenderness.

She sees the tension in John's back relax, hears his breathing ease into the rhythms of sleep, and then Holmes stands. Her gaze meets his, and they are both frozen for an instant.

Mary's breath catches in her throat as she finds herself scrutinized by Sherlock Holmes. It is disconcerting to feel oneself at the mercy of that great intellect, but Mary does not look away. She performs her own study, analyzes the ravages the trials of the last week have left on Holmes' person. She notes the more-than-usual gauntness of his face, the slight tremor in one hand. He is as far from the cruel egotist she originally thought him as it is possible to be, and she finds a fondness for him based on more than his care for John blooming in her breast.

It is Holmes who breaks the paralysis first. He nods an acknowledgement to her, and, with a final look at John, turns to leave the room.

Mary is never entirely sure of her motives for her next actions.

She sits up, reaches over her husband, and takes hold of Holmes' hand. It is warmer than she expected, that hand. She thought his skin would be as cold as the face he shows to the world, but it is as hot as his hidden passions.

He startles at her touch, tries to pull away, but she will not let him.

"He needs us both," she says in reply to the question in his eyes. And then she adds one more word. "Stay."

His eyes widen in surprise. He stares at her in the gloom of the bedroom, and Mary wonders what it is he makes of her, rival, ally, or something else entirely, and wonders further if she will ever have the courage to ask him.

Finally, he nods in agreement.

* * *

Bedclothes and bodies are rearranged, and then they settle down to sleep, Mary on one side, Holmes on the other, and Watson, as always, between them both.

They learn to tolerate, to respect, even to have great affection for each other, Mr. Sherlock Holmes and Mrs. John H. Watson, née Morstan. But it is not easy.

As Holmes will assure her later, nothing worth having ever is.


End file.
